Climate Change Committee Warns That Sunak’s Watering Down of Net Zero Increases the Risk of Britain Failing to Meet its 2050 Target

Rishi Sunak has become engaged in a row with the Climate Change Committee as the advisers claimed his watering down of Net Zero measures will hike costs for families and increase the risk of Britain failing to meet its 2050 target. The Mail has the story.

The Climate Change Committee, an independent body that advises the Government on emissions targets, was scathing of the Prime Minister’s recent action.

Mr. Sunak last month announced he was pushing back the ban on new petrol and diesel vehicles to 2035 and scrapping plans to force landlords to improve the energy efficiency of their properties.

The PM also promised a new exemption for around one-fifth of households from having to replace their gas boilers with low-carbon alternatives.

He claimed his action would save households up to £15,000 over the coming years, while Mr. Sunak insisted Britain would still meet its Net Zero target by 2050.

But, in a new assessment published this afternoon, the CCC blasted the Government for not providing evidence for those claims.

“Recent policy announcements were not accompanied by estimates of their effect on future emissions, nor evidence to back the Government’s assurance that the U.K.’s targets will still be met,” said Professor Piers Forster, chair of the CCC.

“We urge the Government to adopt greater transparency in updating its analysis at the time of major announcements.”

The assessment warned the PM’s cancellation of some Net Zero measures was “likely to increase both energy bills and motoring costs for households”.

“Electric vehicles will be significantly cheaper than petrol and diesel vehicles to own and operate over their lifetimes, so any undermining of their roll-out will ultimately increase costs,” it added.

“The cancellation of regulations on the private-rented sector will lead to higher household energy bills.”

The CCC estimated that, due to current high energy bills, households could be paying £325 extra a year without landlords being compelled to make properties more energy efficient.

Mr. Sunak last month announced he was increasing grants for heat pumps from £5,000 to £7,500, but the CCC said this “has not been accompanied by a larger budget and will, therefore, serve fewer homes”.

They also stated that the new exemption to the planned phase-out of gas boilers could see “significant residual emissions from buildings in 2050”.

The CCC said it remained “concerned” about the likelihood of Britain meeting its future climate targets, including an aim – agreed under the UN process – for a 68% reduction in emissions by 2030, compared to 1990 levels.

Prof. Forster said: “We remain concerned about the likelihood of achieving the U.K.’s future targets, especially the substantial policy gap to the U.K.’s 2030 goal. 

“Around a fifth of the required emissions reductions to 2030 are covered by plans that we assess as insufficient.”

Worth reading in full.

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jeepybee
2 years ago

“…the CCC blasted the Government for not providing evidence for those claims.”

That’s the finest bit of hypocrisy I’ve ever heard in my entire life. Committees are usually a bunch of naive, self-important, pompous c***s at the best of time, but these lads are lacking so much self awareness that I can only laugh.

Where is YOUR evidence, you absolute bags of sh*t? This CCC is pushing for the destruction of civilisation, without any evidence all while censoring actual data, and yet they “blast” and “advise” and “condemn”. Hell upon them all. Livid.

Boomer Bloke
2 years ago
Reply to  jeepybee

Nicely put. I share your outrage.

psychedelia smith
2 years ago
Reply to  jeepybee

The head of the CCC Gummer (Lord Deben to fellow members of the cartel) & family all have investments up the arse in so-called ‘renewables’. As do most other cockroaches of the House. That’s the problem. Until there’s a drone strike on the CCC and the climate change act is consigned to the dustbin of history it’s all systems go and hello again 17th century..

Matt Dalby
Matt Dalby
2 years ago

Opinion polls have to be taken with a pinch of salt, but they seem to suggest that a lot of people support net zero in principle but go off the idea once they realise the cost they’ll have to pay. Therefore if the government simply scrapped the climate change act they could loose a lot of support. A better approach might be to keep a commitment to reach net zero, but amend the act to say that policies to reduce emissions should only be introduced if it can be shown they won’t increase costs for ordinary people. Since EVs, heat pumps, renewable energy etc. are currently more expensive than fossil fuel alternatives this would rule them out while the government would still look like it wanted to do ‘the right thing’. An alternative would be to commit to reduce emissions in line with global commitments to reduce emissions. Given that China, India and loads of other countries are building huge numbers of coal fired power stations and their emissions are going to keep increasing for a least a decade this would mean we have to do nothing for ages as we’ve already cut emissions since 1990 and it’s unlikely China… Read more »

Less government
2 years ago
Reply to  Matt Dalby

It’s time for the people to wake up and see this insanity for what it is. A massive scam against the people of this country and across the globe.

Epi
Epi
2 years ago

hello again 17th century.” Optimistic I’d say they want us back in caves or dead preferably.

The Real Engineer
The Real Engineer
2 years ago
Reply to  Epi

You will be dead soon, if you had the Vax.
https://youtu.be/42uoERKuzo4?si=5g1xq6__4RXrE4ff
Cancer is almost always fatal .

Less government
2 years ago

Vote Reform Party.

sskinner
2 years ago
Reply to  jeepybee

The environmental and climate hysterics have had a free ride for decades and I’m hoping that enough people are now awake that they can be seen off. Paul Ehrlich wrote The Population Bomb in 1968 and none of his dire predictions have come true, but has he changed his tune? Of course he hasn’t. Here are a small sample of quotes from a number determined misanthropes. These people and others are listened to without scrutiny as if they are scientists, but they are not: Giving society cheap, abundant energy would be the equivalent of giving an idiot child a machine gun Paul Ehrlich We contend that the position of the nuclear promoters is preposterous beyond the wildest imaginings of most nuclear opponents, primarily because one of the purported ‘benefits’ of nuclear power, the availability of cheap and abundant energy, is in fact a liability. Paul Ehrlich A cancer is an uncontrolled multiplication of cells; the population explosion is an uncontrolled multiplication of people. We must shift our efforts from the treatment of the symptoms to the cutting out of the cancer Paul Ehrlich The addition of a temporary sterilant to staple food, or to the water supply. With limited distribution… Read more »

huxleypiggles
2 years ago
Reply to  jeepybee

Apologies – I posted before reading the comments.

jeepybee
2 years ago
Reply to  huxleypiggles

Not at all. Great minds hux

Less government
2 years ago
Reply to  jeepybee

The globalist shills at the unelected CCC should be referred to the article above and the link to an excellent piece by Michael Kelly on the insane cost of attempting to achieve Net Zero in the US. It is of course an enormous scam to impoverish us all and exert control over every aspect of our lives. This corrupt cabal, with their noses in the trough, threatening the equally compromised Government that set them up so that we the people can be fined or imprisoned for non compliance and colluding with big corporations is,indeed,despicable.

JXB
JXB
2 years ago
Reply to  jeepybee

Out with it – don’t hold back!

AynRandyAndy
2 years ago

“Climate Change Committee Warns That Sunak’s Watering Down of Net Zero Increases the Risk of Britain Failing to Meet its 2050 Target”
Good.

He should sack all the members of the Climate Change Committee (and legions of associated hanger-ons).

And if he doesn’t have the power to do that, he should make sure no taxpayer funding (theft) is used to support the boondoggle.

But he won’t.

Tyrbiter
Tyrbiter
2 years ago

Good, get the torpedoes in the water and sink the CCC, IPCC and any other insane AGW adherents. We can burn their carbon too.

transmissionofflame
2 years ago

In other news, fire insurance companies say that fires are like really dangerous and will surely become more common, and local companies in the waste management business express concern that your shop might get smashed up unless you donate to their benevolent fund.

stewart
2 years ago

These people sound like the Saudi clerics of the Net Zero religion.

stewart
2 years ago

Who the **** are the climate change committee and why do they have any say whatsoever on my life?

transmissionofflame
2 years ago
Reply to  stewart

It’s SAGE all over again. If you appoint a committee of experts and give them prestige and power and money and career advancement, they are not going to say “oh, nothing to see here, move on, we’re not needed, let’s disband ourselves”.

The committee is a creature of the government.

RW
RW
2 years ago

They’re decidedly worse than SAGE as they’re formally above the government (let alone parliament) and not only informally. Existing legislation binds all UK governments to the 2050 Net Zero target and the CCC are the overseers responsible for ensuring that everyone sticks to the plan.

transmissionofflame
2 years ago
Reply to  RW

Probably worse in that the “climate emergency” is even harder to spot than the “pandemic” so there’s no obvious endpoint to it. Towards 2050 they can make up some other rubbish to prolong it.

RW
RW
2 years ago

I only have my memories of the recent DS article which implied this (and don’t even remember the article itself) but if both are correct, the CCC is formally the real government of the UK in all but the name and all of this continued voting for MPs and other such irrelevant procedures just exists to throw sand into people’s eyes. They’re the Net Zero overseers tasked with cracking the legal whip if something doesn’t seem to be moving according to plan.

transmissionofflame
2 years ago
Reply to  RW

They are a result of the Climate Change Act 2008. The current government could repeal that, if they wished to. But they haven’t. A few possibilities spring to mind:
1) They believe in Nut Zero. I don’t buy that – they are not that stupid.
2) They don’t believe in Nut Zero but they don’t think they would have the votes from some Tory MPs to repeal it. I don’t but this either, though the bit about not having the votes may be true.
3) They don’t believe in Nut Zero but they fear the international reaction if they step out of line. For example, I can easily see a Truss situation where the “markets” decide they want to bring down the government because they don’t like its policies. I think this is plausible.
4) They don’t believe in Nut Zero but it furthers other aims and/or they are doing it to please their global puppet masters. Also plausible.

RW
RW
2 years ago

Why not try a simple explanation? Sunak needs to conduct an election campaign in the not-too-distant future. For this, he needs truckloads of money. As always, Tony ‘my friends can call me Josef’ Blair is the gatekeeper for people with a real lot of money who are willing to put it into election campaigns of parties supporting their political agendas. And hence, it is hard for Sunak to kick against the pricks. Plus he couldn’t care less what will or won’t be happening in 2050 because by that time, he’ll certainly be in a very comfortable overseas retirement if he has proven to be a trustworthy ally of his financiers. At least, that’s the plan.

transmissionofflame
2 years ago
Reply to  RW

Indeed – very plausible.

RW
RW
2 years ago
Reply to  stewart

Featured here recently. It’s an expert panel created by the late or rather, undead and thus, forever ranting and raving on, New Labour government supposed to oversee the Net Zero implementation of future UK governments and to provide advice on how to achieve it this goal.

The Real Engineer
The Real Engineer
2 years ago
Reply to  RW

With many of the things they say they are so far from being “experts” that the term is simply rubbish. They are jumped up little jerks in it for the money. I presume they are on a percentage of the taxes they waste, because there has to be a good reason to even think renewables can power Britain. Starmer is as bad, he wants more wind turbines to stand stationary when the weather doesn’t blow hard enough (which is surprisingly often)! Hot air from politicians doesn’t work although that was promised as the backstop. LOL.

Baldrick
Baldrick
2 years ago

We will fail to meet our 2050 targets, due to the fact that we don’t have the cheap and effective technology yet. It doesn’t exist. End of story.

AynRandyAndy
2 years ago
Reply to  Baldrick

The deliberate use of the weasel-word ‘our’ by those who know best, is no doubt intended to impart a sense of ownership and shared endeavour . . . ‘our NHS’, ‘our Net Zero target’, ‘our Diversity’.

None of which I accept.

The Real Engineer
The Real Engineer
2 years ago
Reply to  AynRandyAndy

They are certainly not mine either.

Marcus Aurelius knew
2 years ago

Oh no. Boo hoo.

psychedelia smith
2 years ago

“Rishi Sunak has become engaged in a row with the Climate Change Committee”

Has he though? Or is this just act 2 of the pantomime? As long as Millipede’s climate change act exists it’s all systems go and nothing is getting watered down.

Lockdown Sceptic
2 years ago

Climate Change Committee: The CCC working for the CCP

CHRIS
CHRIS
2 years ago

So the CCC says “Electric vehicles will be significantly cheaper than petrol and diesel vehicles to own and operate over their lifetimes” but that’s just another one of their many lies. Insurance alone for electric vehicles will rise into the thousands per year due to their high write off risk. I do 25,000 miles a year in my diesel Renault. My fuel bill is under £3000 a year. I get almost 800 miles from a full tank. I paid £5995 4 years ago for it second hand. My insurance, for my sins, is about £650 a year. A Tesla Model 3 costs £43,000 or more. It has a real range of about 200 miles. It costs £29 to fully charge from a home charger. 25,000 miles is going to work out at £4000 a year and this assumes no expensive motorway services or commercial charging. Per a recent Daily Sceptic article by way of The Guardian many Tesla owners are finding their insurance is going to cost £4000 a year or more. So, CCC, flat out lying, just as they lie about the need for Net Zero to even exist, let alone be the UK’s major policy target for many… Read more »

RW
RW
2 years ago
Reply to  CHRIS

So the CCC says “Electric vehicles will be significantly cheaper than petrol and diesel vehicles to own and operate over their lifetimes” but that’s just another one of their many lies.

That’s a misunderstanding on your part: The plan is doubtlessly to get this sorted with ever-increasing taxation.

The Real Engineer
The Real Engineer
2 years ago
Reply to  RW

Whilst increasing tax may be the idea, it would now break the economy. No one of any use has any money left, and the people who can afford anything much are the ones who are useless. Lets sack the lot, overpaid prats!

huxleypiggles
2 years ago

“… in a new assessment published this afternoon, the CCC blasted the Government for not providing evidence for those claims.”

The same CCC that has not produced a scrap of evidence to support its net zero by 2050 position.

Pot – Kettle.

DevonBlueBoy
DevonBlueBoy
2 years ago
Reply to  huxleypiggles

Rules for thee, not for me. And how the word ‘independent’ is abused. There is not a single indepedent thought within the CCC, they run on groupthink.and all are aligned to the idiocy of nut zero.

The Real Engineer
The Real Engineer
2 years ago

Electric cars cheaper over their lifetime? They cost more and the fuel is as expensive as petrol at the Garage. A strange thing to say and completely untrue. Then a new battery every few years (my experience with Li-ion camera batteries has not been great) will cost vastly more. Where do these people live? Islington I suppose, where Harrods is a quick tube line ride away!

The Real Engineer
The Real Engineer
2 years ago

I wonder if there is criticism of the Israli war. Huge anounts of CO2, N20, NO2 and pollutants, along with all the rebuilding materials for Gaza city, which seems fully destroyed, and it will be worse once they try their ground assault. Its all anti-green and should be banned and Israel pay total reparations. See, thats the UK yearly output in a few days. Net zero my foot!

JXB
JXB
2 years ago

“… the Climate Change Committee as the advisers claimed his watering down of Net Zero measures will hike costs for families and increase the risk of Britain failing to meet its 2050 target.”

Good news at last!